He faced and was defeated in the opening round by Doug Williams. Pearce also competed in IWA-Mid South's 2001 Sweet Science Sixteen, defeating Chris Hero and B. J. Whitmer before losing to Ace Steel. Pearce was generally inactive in a national sense, making sporadic appearances on California independent shows put on by Millennium Pro Wrestling and AWS (both based in Los Angeles) and WCWA (based in San Diego). He also made a few appearances for Mid American Wrestling (based in Milwaukee). This would change when Gary Yap contacted Pearce about the soon-to-be-debuting EPIC promotion. He then signed on to wrestle in EPIC promotion, and after it failed he moved to Pro Wrestling Guerrilla (PWG). He was an early fixture of the promotion, and feuded with Joey Ryan, Aaron Aguilera, and Frankie Kazarian among others. He became the second ever PWG Champion when he defeated Kazarian on February 22, 2004, at Taste the Radness. He was the promotion's first heel champion feuding with Aguilera and Babi Slymm until he lost the title on July 10, 2004, back to Kazarian at PWG's One Year Anniversary Show Reason for the Season in a Steel Cage "Loser Leaves PWG" match. Pearce was then very active in Southern California, working for Bart Kapitzke's Alternative Wrestling Show, as both wrestler and matchmaker. Many in the SoCal industry credit Pearce's booking as the reason for a huge upswing in AWS's attendance despite the lack of well-known or flown-in talent. Pearce won the AWS Title under a mask as "The Masked Spymaster II", defeating Babi Slymm (The mask of the Masked Spymaster II was later given as a gift to Colt Cabana for his MTV Wrestling Society X character, Matt Classic). Pearce lost the title months later to Human Tornado in a cage match at AWS' Halloween Slaughterhouse II. Shortly thereafter, he began a feud with former tag team partner Aaron Aguilera. The feud advanced and was tied into a huge WarGames cage match in March 2006, where AWS drew their largest attendance to date. The feud ended in July 2006 when Aguilera defeated Pearce in a brutal strap match. Pearce was also very instrumental in early NWA Pro events in the area, serving as the booker and matchmaker. Mexican independents and New Japan (2004–2005) Upon leaving PWG, Pearce almost immediately debuted in Mexico for Promociones XLUM, where he feuded with Venum Black, Extreme Tiger, Nicho el Millonario,